Early life

Byrd was
born Cornelius Calvin Sale, Jr., in North
Wilkesboro, North
Carolina, in
1917. When he was one year old, his mother, Ada Mae Kirby,
died in the 1918 Flu Pandemic. In
accordance with his mother's wishes, his father, Cornelius Calvin
Sale, dispersed the family children among relatives. Sale Jr. was
given to the custody of Titus and Vlurma Byrd, his uncle and aunt,
who renamed him Robert Carlyle Byrd and raised him in the
coal-mining region of southern
West Virginia.

In 1951, then–State Delegate Robert Byrd was among the official
witnesses of the execution of Harry Burdette and Fred Painter,
which was the first use of the electric
chair in West Virginia. Capital punishment in that state was
abolished in 1965, the last execution having occurred in
1959.

Participation in the Ku Klux Klan

According to Byrd, a Klan official told him, "You have a talent for
leadership, Bob... The country needs young men like you in the
leadership of the nation." Byrd later recalled, "suddenly lights
flashed in my mind! Someone important had recognized my abilities!
I was only 23 or 24 years old, and the thought of a political
career had never really hit me. But strike me that night, it did."
Byrd held the titles Kleagle
(recruiter) and Exalted Cyclops.

When running for the United States House of
Representatives in 1952, he announced "After about a year, I
became disinterested, quit paying my dues, and dropped my
membership in the organization. During the nine years that have
followed, I have never been interested in the Klan." He said he had
joined the Klan because he felt it offered excitement and was
anti-communist. However, in 1946 or
1947 he wrote a letter to a Grand
Wizard stating, "The Klan is needed today as never before and I
am anxious to see its rebirth here in West Virginia and in every
state in the nation."

In 1997, he told an interviewer he would encourage young people to
become involved in politics, but to "Be sure you avoid the Ku Klux
Klan. Don't get that albatross
around your neck. Once you've made that mistake, you inhibit your
operations in the political arena." In his latest autobiography,
Byrd explained that he was a member because he "was sorely
afflicted with tunnel vision—a jejune and immature outlook—seeing
only what I wanted to see because I thought the Klan could provide
an outlet for my talents and ambitions." Byrd also said, in
2005,

While Byrd faced some vigorous Republican opposition in the past,
he has not faced truly serious opposition since freshman
congressman Cleve Benedict took a run
at him in 1982. He has since won by comfortable margins. Despite
his tremendous popularity in the state, he has run unopposed only
once, in 1976. On two other occasions—in 1994 and 2000—he won all
55 of West Virginia's counties. In his reelection bid in 2000, he
won all but seven of West Virginia's precincts. Shelley Moore Capito, a Congresswoman
and the daughter of Byrd's longtime foe, former governor Arch Moore, Jr., briefly considered a
challenge to Byrd in 2006, but decided against it.

In the 1960 Democratic Presidential election primaries, Byrd, a
close Senate ally of Lyndon B.Johnson, endorsed and campaigned
for Hubert Humphrey over front
runner John F. Kennedy in the
crucial West Virginia primary.
However, Kennedy won the state's primary and, eventually, the
general election.

The record of public service longevity

An earlier portrait of Robert
Byrd

Byrd was elected to an unprecedented ninth consecutive term in the
Senate on November 7, 2006. He became the
longest-serving senator in American history on June 12, 2006,
surpassing Strom Thurmond of South Carolina with 17,327 days of service. On November 18,
2009, he became the longest serving member in congressional history
with 56 years 320 days of service, passing Carl Hayden, an Arizona politician. Previously,
he had held the record for the
longest unbroken tenure in the Senate. Considering his tenure
as state legislator from 1947 to 1953, Byrd's service on the
political front exceeds 60 years. Byrd, who has never lost an
election, cast his 18,000th vote on June 21, 2007, the most of any
senator in history.

Filibuster of the Civil Rights Act of 1964

Byrd joined with other Southern and border state Democrats to filibuster the Civil Rights Act of 1964,
personally filibustering the bill for 14 hours, a move he now says
he regrets. Despite an 83 day filibuster
in the Senate, both parties in Congress voted overwhelmingly in
favor of the Act, and President Johnson signed the bill into law.
He also opposed the Voting
Rights Act of 1965, but voted for the Civil Rights Act of 1968. In 2005,
Byrd told The Washington
Post that his membership in the Baptist church led to a change in his views. In the
opinion of one reviewer, Byrd, along with other Southern and border
state Democrats, came to realize that he would have to temper "his
blatantly segregationist views"
and move to the Democratic Party mainstream if he wanted to play a
role nationally.

Because of his opposition to desegregation, Byrd was often regarded
as a Dixiecrat, a member of this
Democratic Party wing that opposed desegregation and civil rights
imposed by the Federal Government. However, despite his early
career in the KKK, Byrd was linked to
such "Dixiecrat" Senators as John C.Stennis, J.William Fulbright or George Smathers, who based their
segregationist positions on their conception of states' rights in contrast to, for example,
James Eastland, who held a reputation
as a committed racist.

Leadership roles

Detail of the Senate desk used by
Democratic leaders, including Byrd

Byrd has been a member of the Senate Democratic leadership since
1967, when he was elected as secretary of the Senate Democratic
Conference from 1967 to 1971. He became Senate Majority Whip, or the
second-ranking Democrat, for six years beginning in 1971. From 1977
to 1989 Byrd was the leader of the Senate Democrats, serving as
Senate
Majority Leader from 1977 to 1981 and 1987 to 1989 and as
Senate
Minority Leader from 1981 to 1987.

In 1976, Byrd was the "favorite son" candidate in West Virginia's
primary. His easy victory gave him control of the delegation to the
national convention. Byrd had the inside track as majority whip,
but focused most of his time on campaigning for the office of
majority leader, more so than for re-election to the Senate, as he
was virtually unopposed for his fourth term. By the time the vote
for majority leader was at hand, he had it so wrapped up that his
lone rival, Minnesota's Hubert
Humphrey, withdrew before the balloting took place.

Byrd is well known for steering federal dollars to West Virginia,
one of the country's poorest states. He is called by some the "King
of Pork." After becoming chair of the
Appropriations
Committee in 1989, Byrd sought to steer, over time, a total of
$1 billion for public works in the state. He passed that mark in
1991, and the steady stream of funds for highways, dams,
educational institutions, and federal agency offices has continued
unabated over the course of his membership. More than thirty
pending or existing federal projects bear Byrd's name. He commented
on his reputation for attaining funds for projects in West Virginia
in August 2006 when he called himself "Big Daddy" at the dedication
to the Robert C. Byrd Biotechnology Science Center.

Byrd is also known for using his knowledge of parliamentary procedure: Before the
"Reagan Revolution", Byrd
frustrated Republicans with his encyclopedic knowledge of the inner
workings of the Senate. From 1977 to 1979 he was described as
"performing a procedural tap dance around the minority,
outmaneuvering Republicans with his mastery of the Senate's arcane
rules." In 1988, while Majority Leader, he moved a call of the Senate, which was adopted by
the majority present, in order to have the Sergeant at
Arms arrest members not in attendance. One member (Robert Packwood, R-Oregon) was
escorted back to the chamber by the Sergeant-at-Arms in order to
obtain a quorum.

As the
longest-serving Democratic Senator, Byrd has served as President pro tempore four times when
his party has been in the majority: from 1989 until the Republicans
won control of the Senate in 1995; for 17 days in early 2001, when
the Senate was evenly split between parties and outgoing Vice
President Al Gore broke the tie in favor of
the Democrats; when the Democrats regained the majority in June
2001 after Senator Jim Jeffords of
Vermont left the Republican party to become an independent;
and again in 2007, as a result of the 2006 Senate
elections. In this capacity, Byrd is third in the line
of presidential succession, currently behind Vice President
Joe Biden and Speaker of the House
Nancy Pelosi.

Scholarships and TAH History Grants

In 1969, Byrd launched a Scholastic Recognition Award; he also
began to present a savings bond to valedictorians from high
schools, public and private, in West Virginia. In 1985 Congress
approved the nation's only merit-based scholarship program funded
through the U.S.Department of
Education, which Congress later named in Byrd's honor. The
Robert C.Byrd Honors
Scholarship Program initially comprised a one-year, $1,500
award to students with "outstanding academic achievement" and who
had been accepted for enrollment at an institution of higher
learning. From 1993 onwards, the program began providing four-year
scholarships; students who received the first-year scholarship then
could apply for stipends for the next three years.

In 2002 Byrd secured unanimous approval for a major national
initiative to strengthen the teaching of "traditional American
history" in the K12 public schools. The Department of Education
awards in competition $50 to $120 million a year to school
districts (in sums of about $500,000 to $1 million). The money goes
to teacher training programs, operated in conjunction with
universities or museums, geared to improving the content skills of
history teachers. Referred to as a "TAH Grant," these awards come
under the “Learning the Lessons of American History” initiative to
strengthen and improve the teaching of American history in the
schools.

Senate historian

Byrd and Dr Richard Baker, a Senate
historian

Television cameras were first introduced to the House of
Representatives on March 19, 1979 with the launch of C-SPAN. Fearing that Americans only saw the Congress
as the House of Representatives, Byrd believed that Senate
proceedings should be televised to prevent the Senate from becoming
the "invisible branch" of government. Thanks in part to Byrd's
efforts, cameras came to the Senate floor in June 1986. To help
introduce the public to the inner workings of the legislative
process, Byrd launched a series of speeches based on his
examination of the Roman Republic and
the intent of the Framers. Byrd published a four-volume series on
Senate history: The Senate: 1789–1989.

For that work, the American Historical
Association, presented Byrd with the first Theodore
Roosevelt-Woodrow Wilson Award for Civil Service on January 8,
2004. The honorific award is intended to recognize individuals
outside the academy "who have made a significant contribution to
history." During the 1980s, he delivered a hundred speeches on the
floor dealing with various aspects of the Senate's history, which
were published in four volumes as The Senate, 1789–1989:
Addresses on the History of the Senate (Government Printing
Office, 1989–94). The first volume of his series won the Henry
Adams Prize of the Society for History in the Federal Government as
"an outstanding contribution to research in the history of the
Federal Government." He also published The Senate of the Roman
Republic: Addresses on the History of Roman Constitutionalism
(Government Printing Office, 1995).

Recent Senate highlights

On July 19, 2007, Byrd, a self-described dog lover, gave a
25-minute passionate speech in the Senate against dog fighting, in response to the indictment of
football player Michael Vick. Byrd
called dog fighting a "brutal, sadistic event motivated by
barbarism of the worst sort and cruelty of the worst, worst, worst
sadistic kind. One is left wondering: 'Who are the real animals:
the creatures inside the ring, or the creatures outside the ring?'"
In recognition of the speech, People for the
Ethical Treatment of Animals named Byrd their 2007 Person
of the Year.

For 2007, Byrd was deemed the fourteenth-most powerful U.S.
Senator, as well as the twelfth most powerful Democratic
Senator.

Byrd with farmers from West
Virginia

On May
19, 2008, Byrd released a statement endorsing Barack Obama (D-Illinois) for President of the United States. One
week after the West Virginia Democratic Primary, in which Hillary Clinton defeated Obama by 41.32
percent, Byrd said, "Barack Obama is a noble-hearted patriot and
humble Christian, and he has my full faith
and support." In a written statement, Byrd stated Obama was "a
shining young statesman, who possesses the personal temperament and
courage necessary to extricate our country from this costly
misadventure in Iraq." When asked in October 2008 about the
possibility that the issue of race would influence West Virginia
voters, as Obama is an African-American, Byrd replied, "Those days
are gone. Gone!" Obama went on to lose West Virginia (by 13
percent), but win the November 2008 presidential
election.

Political views

Voting record

Senate Majority Leader Robert
Byrd

On occasion, Byrd disagreed with President Bill Clinton's policies. Byrd initially said
that the impeachment proceedings
against Clinton should be taken seriously and conducted completely.
Although he harshly criticized any attempt to make light of it, he
made the motion to dismiss the charges against the president and
effectively suspend proceedings. Even though he voted against both
articles of impeachment, he was the sole Democrat to vote for the
censure of Clinton. He strongly opposed
Clinton's 1993 efforts to allow gays to serve in the military and has also
supported efforts to limit gay
marriage, in 1996 before with the pending passage of the
Defense of Marriage Act he
said The drive for same-sex marriage,is, in effect,
an effort to make a sneak attack on society by encoding this
aberrant behavior in legal form before society itself has decided
it should be legal...Let us defend the oldest institution, the
institution of marriage between male and female as set forth in the
Holy Bible.

However, he opposed the Federal Marriage Amendment,
arguing that it was unnecessary because the states already had the
power to ban gay marriages. However, when the amendment came to the
Senate floor he was one of the two Democratic Senators who voted in
favor of the cloture motion. He also opposes
affirmative action.

Byrd is opposed to the Flag
Desecration Amendment, saying that, while he wants to protect
the American flag, he believed that
amending the constitution "is not the most expeditious way to
protect this revered symbol of our Republic." In response to the
amendment, Byrd has cosponsored S. 1370, a bill that prohibits
destruction or desecration of the flag by anyone trying to incite
violence or causing a breach of the peace. It also provides that
anyone who steals, damages, or destroys a flag on federal property,
whether a flag owned by the federal government or a private group
or individual, can be imprisoned for up to two years, or can be
fined up to $250,000, or both.

In 2004, Byrd offered an amendment that would limit the personnel
in Plan Colombia, but was defeated in
the Senate.

Byrd received a 65 percent vote rating from the League of
Conservation Voters for his support of environmentally friendly
legislation. Additionally, he received a "liberal" rating of 65.5%
by the National Journal —
higher than six other Democratic senators.

In 2009, Byrd was one of three Democrats to oppose the confirmation
of Secretary of
the TreasuryTimothy Geithner.
Geithner was confirmed 60-34. After missing nearly two months of
votes due to being hospitalized, Byrd returned to the senate floor
on July 21 to vote against the elimination of funding for the F-22
fighter plane.

Race and race relations

Portrait of then-Majority Leader
Byrd

In a March 4, 2001 interview with Tony
Snow, Byrd said of race relations:

Byrd's use of the term "white nigger" created immediate
controversy. When asked about it, Byrd responded,

Byrd has since explicitly renounced his earlier views on racial segregation. Byrd said that he
regrets filibustering and voting against
the Civil Rights Act of
1964 and would change it if he had the opportunity. He has
stated that joining the KKK was "the greatest mistake I ever made".
Byrd has also said that his views changed dramatically after his
teenage grandson was killed in a 1982 traffic accident, which put
him in a deep emotional valley. "The death of my grandson caused me
to stop and think," said Byrd, adding he came to realize that black
people love their children as much as he does his.

Byrd is
the only Senator to have voted against the nominations of both
Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas to the United
States Supreme Court, the only two African-Americans to have been nominated to
the court. Marshall's confirmation vote came in 1967 when
Byrd and other segregationist senators were opposed to the idea of
a black integrationist being
placed on the court. In order to gain evidence against Marshall's
appointment, Byrd asked FBI Director
J.Edgar Hoover to look into what Byrd believed
to be the possibility that Marshall had either connections to
communists or a potential communist past.
Byrd opposed Thomas because Byrd stated that he was offended by
Thomas using the phrase "high-tech lynching
of uppity blacks" in his defense. Byrd stated that he was "offended
by the injection of racism" into the hearing. He called Thomas's
comments a "diversionary tactic". Byrd commented upon the racism
issue that Thomas raised by stating that "I [Byrd] thought we were
past that stage." Byrd dismissed Thomas' racism charges by stating
that Thomas exhibited "arrogance" and Thomas' comments were
"nonsense, nonsense." Regarding Anita
Hill's sexual harassment
charges against Thomas, Byrd believed Hill. Byrd joined 45 other
Democrats in their opposition to Thomas. Byrd also opposed some of
George W.Bush's judicial and cabinet nominees who were
black, notably Janice Rogers
Brown for judge of the
United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia
Circuit and Condoleezza Rice
for Secretary of
State. Despite his opposition to Brown's appointment, Byrd
would later ally himself with the Gang of
14 that would ensure that Brown's nomination would not be
filibustered.

In the National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People's (NAACP)
Congressional Report Card for the 108th Congress (spanning the
2003–2004 congressional session), Byrd was awarded with an approval
rating of 100 percent for favoring the NAACP's position in all 33
bills presented to the United States Senate regarding issues of
their concern. Only 16 other Senators of the same session matched
this approval rating. In June 2005, Byrd proposed an additional $10
million in federal funding for the Martin Luther King memorial in
Washington, D.C., remarking that "With the passage of time, we have
come to learn that his Dream
was the American Dream, and few ever
expressed it more eloquently."

War in Iraq

In the 107th Congress, Byrd suffered some legislative setbacks,
particularly with respect to debates on homeland security. Byrd opposed the 2002
law creating the Department of Homeland
Security, saying it ceded too much authority to the executive branch. He led a
filibuster against the resolution granting PresidentGeorge W.Bush
broad power to wage a "preemptive"
war against Iraq, but he could not get a majority of his own
party to vote against cloture and against
the resolution. He also led the opposition to Bush's bid to win
back the power to negotiate trade deals that Congress cannot amend,
but lost overwhelmingly. In the 108th Congress, however, Byrd won
his party's top seat on the new Homeland Security Appropriations
Subcommittee.

On March 19, 2003, when Bush ordered the invasion after receiving
U.S.Congress approval, Byrd stated:

Byrd also
criticized Bush for his speech declaring the "end of major combat
operations" in Iraq, which Bush made on the U.S.S.Abraham Lincoln. Byrd stated on the Senate floor:

On October 17, 2003, Byrd delivered a speech expressing his
concerns about the future of the nation and his unequivocal
antipathy to Bush's policies. Referencing the Hans Christian Andersen children's
tale The Emperor's New
Clothes, Byrd said of the president: "the emperor has no
clothes." Byrd further lamented the "sheep-like" behavior of the
"cowed Members of this Senate" and called on them to oppose the
continuation of a "war based on falsehoods."

In July 2004, Byrd released the book Losing America:
Confronting a Reckless and Arrogant Presidency about the Bush
presidency and the war in Iraq.

Of the more than 17,000 votes he has cast as a Senator, Byrd says
he is proudest of his vote against the Iraq war resolution. Byrd
has also voted for funding the Iraq war with a timetable for troop
withdrawal.

Gang of 14

On May 23, 2005, Byrd was one of 14 Senators (who became known as
the "Gang of 14") to forge a compromise
on the use of the judicial filibuster,
thus securing up and down votes for the judicial nominees and
ending the threat of the so-called nuclear option. Under the
agreement, the senators would retain the power to filibuster a
judicial nominee in only an "extraordinary circumstance". It
ensured that the appellate court
nominees (Janice Rogers Brown,
Priscilla Owen and William Pryor) would receive a vote by
the full Senate.

Electoral history

2006 re-election campaign

After several major Republican figures in the state decided not to
run against Byrd, the Republican party convinced John Raese to run for this seat. Raese is the
owner of radio stations and a newspaper in West Virginia. He ran
unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate in 1984 against then Governor
Jay Rockefeller. In 1988, he ran
against Governor Arch Moore for
the Republican nomination and lost.

Raese won the May 2006 primary with 58 percent of the vote,
defeating five other candidates. Byrd defeated him on November 7,
2006, securing a ninth consecutive term in the Senate.

Health issues

On
February 26, 2008, Byrd was admitted to Walter Reed
Army Medical Center for observation following a fall at his home the
day before. Byrd attended Senate sessions on that day, but
complained of pain and his aides asked him to see the Capitol
physician before he went to the hospital. Byrd stayed in the
hospital for four days; no broken bones were found. On March 5, he
was readmitted because of his reactions to antibiotics and the need for tests to determine
a different course of medication, a statement from his office
said.Byrd was admitted to the hospital again on June 2, 2008. He
recuperated at home and by June 18 had returned to chairing his
committee.

On January 20, 2009, Senator Ted Kennedy
suffered a seizure during Barack Obama's inaugural
luncheon and was taken away in an ambulance. Byrd, seated at
the same table, grew emotional over his colleague's continuing
seizures and was himself removed to his office. Byrd's office
reported that he was fine.

On May 18, 2009, it was reported that Byrd had been admitted to the
hospital after experiencing a fever due to a "minor infection." His
stay at the hospital was prolonged due to a staph infection. Byrd was released on June
30, 2009.

Family

Wife

Byrd's mother, Ada Mae Kirby

Erma Ora
James was born on June 12, 1917 in Floyd
County, Virginia to Fred and Mary James, and was the daughter of a
coal miner. She had one sister, Beulah Minton. At an early age, she
relocated to Raleigh County, West Virginia with her family. There she met Robert Byrd
while attending Mark Twain School.

On May 29, 1937, she married Robert Byrd when both were 19 years
old. The small ceremony was attended only by their parents at the
home of Reverend U.G. Nichols.

Beginning
in 1958, Erma was a member of the Senate Wives Club, and was
involved in Senate Wives' Red Cross projects. In 1990, she was selected as
Daughter of the Year by the West Virginia Society of Washington,
D.C. She
was later awarded a degree from the University of Hard Knocks at
Alderson-Broaddus College in 1991, and in 1994, Marshall
University initiated the Erma Byrd Scholars Program.This was
followed with the Loyalty Permanent Endowment Fund of the West
Virginia University Alumni Association, who established the Erma Ora
Byrd Scholarship.

In
October 1997, the Erma Byrd Garden at the Graceland Mansion at the
Davis and
Elkins College was dedicated. She received her Bachelor of
Arts degree from Wheeling
Jesuit University soon after, which was followed up with the
dedication of the Erma Ora Byrd Center for Educational Technologies
on the campus.

In May 1999, she was named Mother of the Year by the Thunder of the
Tygart Foundation at the birthplace of Anna
Jarvis, the surmised founder of Mother's Day. She received the Graduate of Distinction
Award from the Education Alliance in Charleston,
West Virginia in the same month. In January 2004, the Erma
Byrd Gallery at the University of Charleston opened.

On March 25, 2006, Erma Byrd died after battling a lengthy illness.
Robert Byrd has dedicated several buildings in honor of his wife.
On June 12, 2007, he dedicated the Erma Ora Byrd Hall nursing
building at Shepherd University.
Also, on
September 13, 2008, Byrd dedicated the West
Virginia University Erma Byrd Biomedical Research Center. The
building houses the university's Sensory Neurosciences Research
Center, the Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Cardiovascular
Sciences, the School of Pharmacy, and the Multiple Sclerosis and
Neurodegenerative Diseases Research Center.

Byrd in popular culture

Byrd has a prominent role in the 2008 Warner Bros. documentary Body of War. The film chronicles the life
of Tomas Young, paralyzed from the chest down after an Iraqi sniper
shot him as he was riding in a vehicle in Iraq. Several long clips
of Byrd show him passionately arguing against authorizing the use
of force in Iraq. Later in the movie, Byrd has a one-on-one
interview with Tomas Young in Byrd's Senate office, with a grand
shot of Byrd walking beside the wheelchair-bound Young as they
leave the Capitol.

In the Jeffrey Archer novel
Shall We Tell the
President?Byrd, a Senate Majority Leader, was
mentioned as the Senator, possible involvement in assassination
plot against President (in first book version Ted Kennedy and later Florentyna Kane), but he
was a suspect just because he was in Washington D.C. at a certain time, not because he was a political
enemy or had any interest in killing the President.

Byrd was an avid fiddle player for most
of his life, starting in his teens when he played in various square
dance bands. Once he entered politics, he used his fiddling skills
to attract attention and win votes. In 1978 when Byrd was Majority
Leader, he recorded an album called U.S.Senator
Robert Byrd: Mountain Fiddler (County, 1978). Byrd was
accompanied by Country Gentlemen
Doyle Lawson, James Bailey, and Spider Gilliam. Most of the LP
consists of "old-timey" mountain music. Byrd covers "Don't Let Your
Sweet Love Die," a Zeke Manners song,
and "Will the
Circle Be Unbroken." He has performed at the Kennedy
Center, on the Grand Ole Opry and on Hee
Haw. He can no longer play the fiddle due to the
symptoms of a benign essential
tremor that affects his hands. Prior to that, he would
occasionally take a break from Senate business to entertain
audiences with his fiddle.

J. Taylor Rushing, On June 2, the television network
MSNBC reported that Byrd had
once again been admitted to the hospital suffering from lethargy
and a fever. "Byrd sent back to hospital", The
Hill, March 5, 2008